The trials and tribulations of a big change!

My little bubble

I’m a very emotional person, and this often means that I react before I think – which isn’t always a good thing. It also means that I become, perhaps a little too, passionate about things. Many of the people I know don’t know that I have a sister, Tanya, who’s mentally handicapped and it’s not because it’s something I want to hide – I’m so very proud of my sister and who she is and I wouldn’t change her for the world. If I were given the chance to reverse her handicap, I’d decline – because she’d no longer be the person she is and that would be a great loss to the world.

But coming back to my emotions – perhaps it’s having grown up with Tanya and seeing peoples’ reactions to her that have given me the fire and passion to speak out and get emotional when people are wronged and when injustice, heartache and abuse abound? One hears about houses that burn down, parents that are killed, people who abuse – and you automatically feel sorry for the individuals involved – but sometimes we forget that some of those individuals could be people who really cannot defend themselves – mentally handicapped individuals, young children, infants, or the elderly. Somehow there seems to be a greater injustice when they’re involved simply because there’s just no way they could ever prevent what’s happening to them – if a house burns down and a mentally handicapped person happens to be in it…he or she may not have the understanding to call for help; think about how desolate and confused you’d feel – now multiply that by 20 and you’ll catch the smallest glimpse of how they would feel.

And day in and day out I moan about the fact that I can’t buy the awesome jeans I saw, or the fact that although I have food in the house, I feel like eating out and that’s what I want so that’s what I’m going to get. Sure, I’m not saying these things aren’t there for us to enjoy – they are – but enjoy them with humble, thankful hearts and just always remain mindful of the bigger picture. There’s more to life than me and my little bubble…

I’ve had a yearning in my heart of late to get into action – so lift my arse off the couch and actually do something for other people –for those who simply cannot do it themselves, for whatever reason. And it’s this yearning that’s made me realise that my emotions are a good thing – I always thought they were silly and unwarranted – but I’ve come to understand that they simply were misdirected! I need to take those strong emotions I have and use them to force me to act. I don’t care how small the difference is that I can make – the point is, I need to do something…

Sure, now and then I’ll fall back into the curse of humanity’s way of thinking and I’ll get stuck in the normality of life – paying bills, buying groceries, meeting friends for coffee…but I have to remember to hold myself accountable to a bigger picture.

If just half my continent’s population thought this way, it would start a complete revolution…just half the continent’s population…

This is one video that I couldn’t watch through to completion until very recently – simply because it stirred in me something I was afraid of – but something I’m realising more and more is a calling that God’s placed on my life…